RIYADH, May 26: A Saudi woman was killed in a car crash as she defied a ban on women drivers, a newspaper reported on Thursday. The woman, who was in her fifties, took her car to go shopping in the village of Nasah, west of Riyadh, but died in an accident, Al Watan said. The incident occurred at the end of last week, it added.

Saudi Arabia’s appointed consultative council on Sunday shelved a proposal by one of its members to lift the ban on women behind the wheel. Despite the prohibition, there have been cases of women driving in rural and desert areas to buy supplies for their homes or help with farming activities.

Al Watan last week published a photograph of a veiled woman driving a pickup truck who said she ferried agricultural produce and livestock from the desert area where she lives to the outskirts of the northern town of Hail to sell them because her husband is paralyzed and cannot do it himself.—AFP